Sacramento police share license plate data with anti-abortion states, civil rights groups argue

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CIVIL RIGHTS GROUPS URGE SAC PD TO STOP SHARING ALPR DATA OUT OF STATE

Nearly two months after the San Francisco Chronicle revealed that the Sacramento Police Department is sharing automated license plate reader (ALPR) data with out-of-state law enforcement agencies, a pair of civil rights groups have written a letter urging the department to cease the practice.

Jennifer Pinsof, staff attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and Nick Hidalgo, staff attorney for the ACLU of Northern California, sent the letter to Sacramento Police Chief Katherine Lester and and City Attorney Susana Alcala Wood, urging them to not just stop sharing ALPR data with state law enforcement that could use it to prosecute people for seeking abortions or gender-affirming medical treatment, but to abandon the use of such cameras altogether.

“The risks to civil liberties and civil rights that ALPR technology creates are well-documented. Even if Sacramento PD takes steps to prevent the formal sharing of data with out-of-state agencies, the risk of informal sharing with these same agencies will remain,” the letter reads in part.

The letter gives Lester and Alcala Wood until May 30 to respond. Neither Lester nor Alcala Wood responded to The Bee’s request for comment by deadline.

Sacramento PD isn’t the only California law enforcement agency to share that data. As we’ve previously documented here, a number of agencies in the state do so, including the Sacramento County Sheriff’s Office.

Sacramento County Sheriff Jim Cooper, who voted for the law prohibiting outside sharing when he still served in the Assembly, has defended his office’s practice and criticized the EFF, accusing them of “protecting child molesters, fentanyl traffickers, rapists and murderers.”

California Attorney General Rob Bonta last year issued a legal memo to state law enforcement agencies, warning them that sharing ALPR data with out-of-state agencies is illegal.

According to the Chronicle’s report, that memo did not persuade Sacramento PD to change its policy.

THE JANE FONDA DAY TRILOGY CONCLUDES

We bring you a final (we hope!) update on the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors decision to declare April 30 as Jane Fonda Day.

Recall that the board voted to honor Fonda on April 30, the anniversary of the Fall of Saigon, which marks the end of the Vietnam War — which Fonda rather infamously protested.

The decision riled up a host of state lawmakers, including Sen. Janet Nguyen, R-Huntington Beach, whose district includes Little Saigon, the largest population of Vietnamese people outside of Vietnam; and Assemblyman Tri Ta, R-Westminster, who rallied 17 other Assemblymembers, including one Democrat (Assemblywoman Stephanie Nguyen, D-Elk Grove) to call on the board to rescind its vote.

On Friday, Ta announced that the campaign was a success: The board announced that it would introduce a motion at its next meeting to shift Jane Fonda Day to some other, less notorious, date.

“I want to thank everyone who worked with me to fight this decision, and I commend the Board of Supervisors for listening to the concerns raised by the Vietnamese-American community and veterans of the Vietnam War,” Ta said in a statement.

QUOTE OF THE DAY

“So we want a leaner government, leaner government, streamlined government. We want to do what all of you are doing in your personal lives, all the businesses out there doing in their professional lives as well, and we think we can do that and still achieve outstanding outcomes.”

- California Gov. Gavin Newsom, announcing the cutting of 10,000 vacant state worker positions during his May Revise budget press conference.

Best of The Bee (May Revise Edition):

• Gavin Newsom releases $288 billion revised budget for California. How he tackled the big deficit, via Lindsey Holden.

• California could cut 10,000 unfilled state positions in new budget proposed by Newsom, via Stephen Hobbs and Nicole Nixon.

• California Republican leaders respond to Gov. Newsom’s updated budget: ‘The math is not mathing,’ via Jenavieve Hatch.

• Gov. Newsom’s latest budget proposal will affect undocumented Californians. Here’s how, via Mathew Miranda.

• Gavin Newsom addresses state deficit in revised budget, proposing tackling 2-year budgets going forward, via Vik Jolly.